


Sanity Check

by notnowcommander



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: AU, F/M, Fluff, Library
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-30
Updated: 2014-09-30
Packaged: 2018-02-19 08:19:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2381390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notnowcommander/pseuds/notnowcommander
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>10 years prior to the Reaper War, Alliance military trainees Kaidan and Shepard meet in a library on the Citadel, completely unaware of the impact they will have on each other's lives down the road.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sanity Check

The doors to the library hadn’t opened since Kaidan’s shift started four hours ago. He wasn’t too surprised about it either. Everything was digital, and could be easily accessed via Omni-Tool or data pad, so what was the purpose of coming somewhere to get that information? But it worked for him. It was a quaint, small corner of the Citadel where there were minimal lights and noises.  
The pale blue walls set the library up to look like any other room on the Citadel, except this one was lined with small laptops and consoles, and rows upon rows of physical books that most wouldn’t even think to look into reading. But for the several hours that Kaidan manned the circulation desk, it was the best place on the whole station.  
The physical print books reminded him of his home back on the English Bay, where his bedroom had been filled with stacks upon stacks of sci-fi novels, no matter how cheesy or tacky they were. Growing up around the time the Mass Relays were discovered, Kaidan read books about space travel and saving the galaxy, knowing that if he tried hard enough, those adventures and feats wouldn’t just be something he experienced on the crisp pages of his printed books.  
Since joining the Alliance Military and undergoing training, having a side job was probably one of the better ideas that Kaidan had come up with in the past few years. While serving for the Alliance was his choice, on his terms, it certainly didn’t cover or take care of the medical costs that came with the L2s, and he wasn’t alone in thinking that there was more the Alliance could do for those who had survive the implants.  
The person who had just entered the library was a sturdy, earnestly beautiful red-haired girl. She couldn’t have been any more than twenty years old, wearing Alliance military training gear. He’d never seen her around, or at the Academy, which meant she couldn’t have been in his class. She wore her short hair half pulled up and out of her face, bringing attention to her bright green eyes and the soft display of freckles across her nose and forehead. She had a faint scar running along the side of her cheek, thin and faded with time.  
“Ma’am, can I help you?” Kaidan asked, leaning over the desk.  
She looked around the library, clearly uncomfortable with the fact that she was here. He didn’t blame her. Most people who still came to the physical library were uncomfortable that they had to come here.  
“Um, maybe. I just have some work to get done and needed a quiet place to go.”  
Kaidan smiled. “Well, it’s just me here, and I can keep quiet if you’d like.”  
She faintly smiled back. “You’re Alliance military too?”  
He hadn’t noticed that he was still wearing his sweat jacket, thrown on over the gear he’d worn for the day’s training sessions.  
“Oh, yeah.”  
She pulled up a chair in front of the desk. Kaidan was not used to having people come into the library, and he also wasn’t used to having people talk to him while he was working either. The last person to talk to him while he was on duty was an angry Hanar, who wanted a book that someone had checked out, and told him numerous times how “this one is very displeased with the selection of books”. That was three days ago.  
Kaidan leaned forward, resting his arms on the desk in front of him, engaging in conversation at a closer range.  
“I’m still just starting out,” she said coyly, “but eventually, I think I’d like to join the N7.”  
He couldn’t help but smile. Kaidan himself had hardly thought of aiming that high. Now, his biggest goal was to serve the Alliance, and if good things and higher ranks happened to come from that, he would take them as they came.  
“Dreaming big, are we, ma’am?”  
She shrugged her shoulders. “Why the hell not?”  
“Where do you come from?” he asked. Back home, “where do you come from” wasn’t quite as complicated of a question. In Vancouver, or in Canada, period, it mostly meant “which province or country are you from?”. Here on the Citadel, it could have meant any number of things. Kaidan had met people from all clusters, systems, and planets. He’d never seen so much diversity in his life.  
“Mindoir. It’s mostly a farming colony on the border of the Attican Traverse.”  
Kaidan felt his breath catch in his throat. This girl couldn’t have been any more than twenty years old. He recounted the endless headlines he’d seen in the news several years ago, when Batarian slavers slaughtered most of the colonists and forced the survivors to submit to cranial implants used to control them. It was a blood bath, and hearing the horror stories out of the Traverse reminded Kaidan why he’d enlisted in the first place: to help people.  
“Oh,” he said, not sure of what he could say that wouldn’t be too touchy.  
“It’s okay,” she replied. “I get that response everywhere. Alliance patrols picked me up after the raid ended. I don’t know how I survived, but I did, and I intend on making it count. There’s a lot of messed up sons of bitches in the galaxy, and I intend on making them pay. Not just for me, but for everyone.”  
Kaidan felt a smile pull at his lips. “I understand. Sounds like you want to kick some serious ass.”  
“I didn’t want to be the messed up kid coming into the Alliance military. I don’t talk about it. Everyone has their history, and I guess it’s just what you make of your own future that makes the most difference.”  
“Most of us are messed up, ma’am. It’s just what you do with it. Think about it, we could all let the bad parts of our past define us, but where would that get us, y’know? And it sounds like you don’t need me to tell you that.”  
The girl smiled, leaning her arms on the opposing side of the desk. “You speak as if you know that really well.”  
“I don’t like to brag, but I am an L2 biotic and former attendee of BAaT,” he said, stretching out his arms, as if to express to her that those things were really no big deal. But anyone with any knowledge of the world knew that those two things were prime material for a kid to snap, or die.  
“Well, you’re lucky, I suppose,” she started.  
“Yeah, I am,” he paused for a second, looking up at her. It had been years since a girl had left such an impression on him. It hadn’t been since BAaT, actually, that any girl had received an ounce of his attention outside of courtesy. Some of the other soldiers teased him, asking him why he didn’t like to socialize or didn’t join them when they went down to Chora’s Den in the Wards. It wasn’t Rahna, not still. He understood why it could never happen, and why he had to move on from that idea. But it didn’t mean it didn’t make it harder for him to find people he could feel things for.  
Not that this girl in front of him meant anything, but she had a look in her eyes that hinted that she was going to mean something. Maybe if not to him, to someone else. He could tell already that this beautiful girl sitting in front of him was going to do something big.  
The girl looked away for a second, smiling. “I came here to get work done, but I think this is nicer. I think I just needed to decompress a little. Thanks.”  
Kaidan gave her a smile. “Of course. I’m here most of the time, if you ever need another sanity check, ma’am.”  
She smiled back, pushing her wispy red hair out of her face. “Sanity check? I just came to the library to get away from people.”  
“Your lucky day then, ma’am.”  
“But I should get to work, and then I have to meet someone for dinner after that.”  
She collected her things, sliding them into a black bag, and tossing it over her shoulder.  
“Well, you have fun with that, ma’am. And it’s true what I said, y’know. Sanity check. No charge.”  
She nodded and gave a faint smile. “Thanks.”  
“Wait,” Kaidan started. “You got a name?”  
“Most people just call me Shepard.”  
“Shepard? That’s all?” he asked.  
She stepped closer to the door and laughed under her breath. “Yeah, for now.”  
The door opened up, letting her out to the Wards. He watched her leave, her red hair shining under the fluorescent lights of the Citadel, thinking that she was the kind of leader that people would follow into any battle, to hell and back. The kind of person that would make people believe.  
Shepard, he thought, tasting the name on his lips.  
But what he didn’t know, what no one knew, was what the carrier of that name was going to accomplish. He didn’t know that the Shepard who just walked in and out of the library was going to be known as so many more things.  
Commander Shepard. Savior of the Citadel. First Human Spectre. The Shepard.  
But most importantly to Kaidan, his favorite title for her, was the absolute love of his life.


End file.
